My thought on the Current Meta part 3 The Lacking factions

Cryx, Grymkin, Trollbloods, Minions, Convergence 

Third and final part WoHo. Playing and talking about these lists took a lot longer then I thought it would. Oh well. This shit is still totally relevant. These are factions I don't enjoy as much. That means I have not played them as much and don't feel as qualified to talk about them. That might also be a factor to why I think they are lacking.

Cryx

For me Cryx is all about that Ghost Fleet. What version you bring to a tournament is very meta dependent I think. Most of the themes you just have that one clear cut build. For Ghost Fleet that depends on the meta. Black Banes+Wraith Engine help a lot vs Cygnar, since they can eat electro leaps. On the other hand they are a weakness against Legion, with the Naga and free Sorcs+Forsakens running rampant. You really want as many dudes as possible to overwhelm the legion player. If there are a lot of Fyanna2 players in your meta I would recommend playing Goreshade3. Otherwise I think Denny1 is the best pick. She still has that assassination out. Which works great with getting back 9 rifles a turn and shooting people. Some people are trying to convince me Terminus is good but I just don't see it. Tested a game with it and it felt a lot weaker than Denny1.

To partner with that list I think you build a Witch Coven in Infernal Machines. You trade Satyxis and Kraken from the old build to get Deathjack and a second unit of Soulhunters and some support solos. Then for free you get 2 pistol wraiths and a Warwitch siren. Testing the list I really loved Advance Deployment on Bile Thralls. The ambushing Mechanithralls also kept my opponent from going wide on my feat turn. Which was nice. I am generally not a fan of ambush but it's good on a 6 points unit.

As a legion player I love playing against Cryx. Mostly since it's cathartic to see where they are now. The wall of bullshit that was Gaspy2 prenerf is something new people will not understand. I just wish Haley2 got the same treatment. Anyway Cryx shooting defense is clouds and stealth. That does not work against legion. Usually Cryx lists don't bring enough large bases to body block their caster properly. So they randomly die.

Grymkin

Since this is a bit of a new faction for people you probably don't know what to expect. Grymkin is the new grind faction. All their models are cheaper and worse versions of other models. This makes them really point efficient. You just get the bare bones but you have more pieces to trade with. The arcanas usually slows down the game and then they just grind you to dust. The way around this is to not trigger any arcana until you get a huge turn where you completely cripple their army. They are also somewhat weak against colossals. They are really good at killing it once they get to it but their threat range tricks don't work on colossals.

The main Grymkin army is 75 points of beasts, 10 trash infantry, 1 battle engine, Lady Rose and 5 free gremlin swarms. This adds up to 4 arm 21 heavies with a couple of shield guards and 5 incorporeal stealth models that stand in the way from you getting a good alpha. Then you add a caster to it. I think the child is strong right now. Since Tantrum stops the opponent from shooting the anything since you will shield guard it onto a beast and then another heavy will threat super far. With Abuse and Lady Roses enrage that one heavy hits hard enough to wreck the day.

Then to partner with that list you want an shooty list. I think Old Witch3 is the best pick. She's got strong synergy with the Hollowmen. She brings back a couple each turn with her Arcane Machinery. The Witch sisters do the same and if they happen to kill living models even more models come back. So it really plays to the long grind strength of Grymkin. While having Windstorm to protect from shooting.

As a legion player Grymkin are really weak. Abby2 and or Fyanna2 shuts all their options down hard. We also play a quicker game plan which Grymkin struggle against. You don't care if your opponent have 3 arcanas if you win the game with just the alpha strike. Which most of our sledge hammers can do. Their shooting is to low pow and to low range to actually be scary for us. They take a bit of extra time to play against on deathclock since you need to think about arcanas so remember to do deployment + first turn quickly.

Trollbloods

They got hit hard in the mark change. The outrage over Madrak2 kind off masked the problem and they didn't get the love they deserve. It's just bad.I have no further input.

Minions

I have played about 10 games of Minions, they were all abusing the throw jank. I have not played a game against them since the power attack nerf. I there for have no input on their state of the game. I think the 7 min posse build is powerful. I don't think it's enough though. Rask is as he's always been a super powerful caster.  Problem is finding a partner for him. I don't think there is another caster in minions that's good enough to help him carry a minion player to the top. If I had to guess I would put them in the B-tier region.

I trust Rickard enough to just steal his lists straight up if I ever had to play Minions. Gi bugger him on Twitter, @Full_Reekard. He loves it when you ask him for his lists.

Convergence of Cyriss

I have played against CoC a total of 3 times in mk3 and have never felt the urge to play them. Axis and Mother seems okayish. Nothing super strong though. Just don't try and shoot the list out. Abby2 is still really strong against them since bracer stops pulls and that's their only threat to Legion. If I had to guess I would put them in the C-tier region.